What a landform is

The chapter opens with the Bhūmi Sūkta, the 'Hymn to the Earth', from the Atharva Veda: 'Free from the burden of human beings, may the Earth with many heights, slopes and great plains, bearing plants endowed with varied powers, spread out for us and show us her riches! … the Earth is my mother and I am her child.' Notice that the hymn already names what this chapter is about: heights, slopes and great plains.

Humans, like most mammals, live on land. And land has many forms; it looks very different from one region to another. If you have ever sat at the window seat of a train or car, you have seen it change: hills, then forest, then flat fields.

The book takes you on a road journey to show it. Start in the Chhota Nagpur region of Jharkhand, travel to Prayagraj in Uttar Pradesh, and go on to Almora in Uttarakhand. On the way you will meet three major landforms: a plateau, then a plain, then mountains. The whole chapter in one journey.

A landform is a physical feature on the surface of the Earth. Landforms take shape over millions of years, and they are closely linked with the environment and with life.

Landforms can broadly be divided into three categories: mountains, plateaus and plains.

Each landform has its own climate and its own flora and fauna. Humans have adapted to all landforms, but the number of people living on each kind of landform is very different around the world.